‘Thought India, Pakistan would go to warfare in 2002; New Delhi confirmed restraint’: Ex-CIA agent


The previous CIA officer additionally mentioned that Pakistan will “lose any typical warfare” with India, stating that New Delhi won’t tolerate the nuclear blackmail by Islamabad anymore.

New Delhi:

Former Central Intelligence Company (CIA) John Kiriakou has mentioned that the US (US) thought India and Pakistan would go to warfare in 2002 following the lethal terror assault on the previous’s Parliament that claimed lives of 9 safety personnel. The US known as India’s coverage ‘strategic endurance’, he mentioned, noting that New Delhi confirmed a number of restraint after the Parliament assault and the 26/11. 

In an interview with information company ANI, Kiriakou, who served first as an analyst after which in counterterrorism within the CIA for 15 years, mentioned India has bought to a degree the place it “cannot danger strategic endurance being misunderstood as weak point”. 

“Members of the family had been evacuated from Islamabad. We believed India and Pakistan would go to warfare,” he mentioned. “The deputy secretary of state got here in and shuttled between Delhi and Islamabad and negotiated a settlement the place either side backed off. However we have been so busy and targeted on Al Qaeda and Afghanistan, we by no means gave two ideas to India.”

‘Pakistan will lose any typical warfare with India’

The previous CIA officer additionally advised ANI that Pakistan will “lose any typical warfare” with India, stating that New Delhi won’t tolerate the nuclear blackmail by Islamabad anymore. 

“Nothing, actually nothing good will come of an precise warfare between India and Pakistan as a result of the Pakistanis will lose. It is so simple as that. They will lose. And I am not speaking about nuclear weapons — I am speaking nearly a standard warfare. And so there isn’t any profit to always upsetting Indians,” he mentioned.

‘India didn’t know US managed Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal’

In his interview, Kiriakou additionally mentioned the US managed the nuclear arsenal of Pakistan when he was stationed there in 2002. He mentioned former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf had given the entry to Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal to the US, including that Washington by no means advised New Delhi about this. 

“I doubt that the People ever advised India that the management of Pakistani nukes additionally lies with the US due to the vociferousness with which the Pakistanis have publicly maintained that they management their very own nuclear weapons,” he mentioned. “However I can inform you definitively that the State Division was telling either side — in case you’re gonna combat, combat. Maintain it brief and maintain it non-nuclear. If nuclear weapons are launched, the entire world goes to vary. And so I believe there was restraint on either side.” 

Additionally Learn – ‘US managed Pak’s nuclear arsenal, it loves working with dictators’: Ex-CIA agent’s bombshell on Musharraf